The past 10 days have been an insanely busy whirlwind of activity for me, and I’m afraid real life pulled me away from online life for a bit. Last Thursday, I gave a presentation at my home university, SIUE, on both my research and podcasting (this was an experimental combination of two talks, and will in the future go back to always being two talks). Tuesday night I gave a talk on professional-amateur astronomy collaborations that highlighted my research on the star AH Leo at the Naperville Astronomical Association outside of Chicago. Both talks went well, and I’ll be recording an online version of the pro-am collaboration talk as time allows. With these presentations behind me and a few last bits of spring break in front of me, I’m going to steal a few days for the three R’s: Research, ‘riting, and recording.

It is a slow science news week, and sitting here at home Iâ€šÃ„Ã´m realizing I havenâ€šÃ„Ã´t the foggiest idea how to get my e-journal fix via SIUE without being at an SIUE IP address. Iâ€šÃ„Ã´d like to riffle through Science or Nature from my sofa. Iâ€šÃ„Ã´d like to think there is a way to do it. Iâ€šÃ„Ã´m not certain however, and after reading through the SIUE website, Iâ€šÃ„Ã´m mostly just confused. Luckily, I know that I do have access to information somehow, it just may not involve being on my sofa while I read. No matter what, I am lucky. Not everyone has access to Science.

Limited access to information (and the decision to actually access that information) acts in many ways to divide our society. It takes money to get the cable and satellite news feeds. Prolonged access to online content – the type of access needed to hunt down links and read background material – takes money or the right job. Knowing how to access information takes education, which is another way of separating the haves from the have-nots. And sorting through digital, video, and audio content takes that most precious resource of all: time. It takes effort to be informed, and one must choose to know what is going on.